Very useful course. It built my Cloud Computing basis from scratch. Fisrt course gives me the enthusiasm to start the later ones. A good place for studying and sharing with course mates. Thank you!
Great course, I would recommend to everyone who wants to understand the basics of cloud computing. The course material is excellent, the instructor Indy is phenomenal and the exams are marvelous.
By Patrick B
•The course is interesting, however, advanced templated C++ code is far too heavy for most. I've dropped the class as I'm not even going to attempt the assignments after viewing the first one.
By Bingqing M
•I do like the material and lectures but the huge problem is there is no TA or platform like Piazza to ask questions. I think it would be nice to just have a TA or advisor to answer questions
By Tao H
•It would have been more helpful to include some more examples for quiz questions. Adding some tutorial materials (or links) in setting up environment would also be greatly appreciated.
By Ben N
•This is not about cloud computing but distributed systems. Feels like a bait and switch. This is not what I was looking to learn (because I've already done that!)
By Darko C
•Homeworks are too much work, Proving that you know concepts should be done few times, not 5 times for each one.
By Raul K
•It is alright. I was expecting some higher quality though. I do not recommend it.
By Mogahed M K Y
•I don't have more time to study but it will be in future
By Darren
•It's too difficult to me. But the interview is good
By Srini
•Some content is legacy.
By Luis C
•I would not recommend this course. Weekly tests are too long and the programming assignment is absurdly difficult.
The course is very interesting as an introduction to Cloud Computing. You learn many concepts related to distributed systems and several protocols on them. Theory and practice are balanced, including practical exercises in the weekly tests and a programming assignment.
However, the weekly tests are very hard from week 3 on, having to spend 1-2 hours to finish them as you need paper to do some drawings. The programming assignment is very difficult, unfair and purposeless. The template is written in C++ and it is not very helpful. You spend 80% dealing with C++ issues rather than learning the protocol concepts. I think you get the whole idea of the protocols without having to spend more than 20 hours creating such a complicated program. Many people didn't complete the course just for not being able to finish the program.
By David C
•This course is totally not for the beginner, even you pass the prerequisite with 100% score easily.
I understand the distributed algorithms could be hard, but the instructor didn't seem to teach in a beginner-friendly way, he just read the PPT without emphasis. In my opinion, this course should just be a little harder than the Algorithm course. (BTW, I couldn't find another alternative yet, maybe other people could suggest.)
Just as lots of other reviewers mentioned, the C++ Gossip assignment is really a mess for a non-C++-expert, even you are an experienced non-C++ programmer.
Hope I could pass this course after I gain lots of insights from other places in the future.
By Zihao C
•Actually this course contains decent material, as long as you don't pay for homework and programming assignment. The homework and final test ask about very detail of a concret implementation, instead of some concept or idea. When it comes to vector timestamp/unicast/multicast, the cases presented in the tests and homeworks are presented in an unnecessarily complicated way. Also the starting code in the programming assignment is written in a bad way, both in codeing style and design decision, and takes you more time to get started with it.
Basically I like the course content. But I won't recommend you to pay for the homework/programming assignment.
By Vitaliy G
•The course is not for beginners and WinForm lovers. This is real re-branding yourself. I would say path to reborn to what real open source world is living in. Low or no help from course instructor, community or google. Course comes in huge amount of concentrated videos. 7 hardest assignments. I would give up on the beginning but commitment is top of all. I respect anyone who has completed.
By Mark S B
•Course lectures don't seem to match up with the questions on the quiz. It is also not clear if the typed in answers are not read by the program correctly or if the answers do not match what the instructor is looking for, in any case the 3 weeks quiz is very difficult to figure out.
By Tushar G
•The response time at discussion forums are disappointing! It'd be helpful, if Mentors could be prompt at resolving doubts. Moreover, I felt that the programming assignment was poorly documented.
By Qiankun X
•the test is terrible and teacher is just reading the ppt. boring
By Yiqing L
•very hard
By Anthony B
•Overall it was a terrible course. The overly simplistic examples in the lectures didn't prepare you for the weekly quizes. The programming assignment was a huge waste of time dealing with poorly within C/C++ code, famish instructions and memory handling like it was the 90' and very little with cloud base algorithm or logic. I saw the same complains over and over for the last three years on the forums and that were for most of it ignored. Where is the professor? A very poor publicity for the University of Illinois
By Ayoub M
•The slides are unclear and very very ugly and old style.
The assignment is very specific to Linux based machine.
Only one programming assignment.
More theory than practices.
The QCMs don't really help understand. They are just about remembering values.
I woudn't recommande this course since it is more like a book then it is like a course.
By Telma C X M
•To be honest I could not finish the course. The lecture speaks to fast and I never had time to think about what I was listening to and get the information settled. I had to give up in the second week! That's a pity!
By Anik C
•Extremely boring with lots of academic stuffs. I am totally disappointed. Even the instructior fails to make the course interactive. The course materials are not good enough.
By Dr P N
•Very worst. Could not understand . NO examples.HOwever he will give good questions but to answer them we cannot find examples from his teaching.
By Margherita S
•Too much technical. I would have preferred high level generic concepts. Also, the exercises were quite tricky for a beginner.
By José L F P
•No adecuate to get business oriented knowledge. All theoretical and academical teaching.
By Judy M
•This is not what I thought it was going to be. I don't care about big ) notation, etc.